[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 67 (Tuesday, May 14, 1996)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5018-S5020]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         ORDER FOR ADJOURNMENT

  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that after I make a 
brief statement and the Senator from Mississippi makes a statement and 
Senator Daschle makes a statement that the Senate stand in adjournment 
under the previous order.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

[[Page S5019]]



                           ORDER OF PROCEDURE

  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I will take just a minute of the Senate's 
time to express my disappointment that we were unable to agree on any 
of the unanimous-consent requests that we presented to my colleagues on 
the other side with respect to the pending gas tax repeal, the TEAM 
Act, minimum wage, taxpayer bill of rights, and the White House travel 
legislation.
  It was my hope that we could reach an understanding. I thought, based 
on conversations, we might be able to work out some procedure to ensure 
that the three main issues--the gas tax repeal, the TEAM Act, and the 
minimum wage were split into three separate bills--that the Senate 
would be able to reach an agreement on an overall consent that would 
include these issues in a relatively short timeframe. But unfortunately 
that does not seem to be the case.

  I think it is fair to say that we have offered pretty much what my 
colleagues had requested, with some minor changes, a consent agreement 
that does, in fact, divide the three issues into separate bills and 
limits time on each issue. I think they could be concluded in as little 
as 5 or 6 hours.
  But now I understand that there are additional requests to not only 
separate the issues, but also to require the approval of the final 
language that the House is marking up in the committee today relative 
to the minimum wage. Obviously, I cannot dictate what the House does 
with minimum wage and cannot ensure what might finally come out of the 
conference.
  But it seems to me that what we should do is move ahead before 
Memorial Day, resolve these three issues, as well as the taxpayer bill 
of rights, which I understand there is no opposition to.
  The gas tax repeal is being held hostage because of the demands about 
the minimum wage. The so-called TEAM Act is unacceptable to my 
colleagues on the other side. I understand there will be a filibuster 
on that issue. I guess the bottom line is, we have been trying to 
figure out some way to resolve this issue. We have not reached it yet.
  I do not believe we will ever be in a position to say to my 
colleagues on the other side that we will guarantee, notwithstanding it 
is a Republican House of Representatives and a Republican Senate, that 
you draft the minimum wage proposal. I do not think that will happen 
because we have some ideas, amendments for the minimum wage. I do not 
know what my House colleagues have in mind, but they may report that 
out later on today.
  So I just suggest that we continue to work with the Democratic 
leader, Senator Daschle. Time is running. I hope that we can act on all 
these issues prior to Memorial Day. But this week we will probably be 
on the budget. Next week we hope to do the missile defense measure, 
along with the DOD authorization bill. That would not leave a lot of 
time for these three issues.
  So I just want to report to the Senate that we have not given up. But 
I do not believe we can ever agree that, in effect, we first have to 
clear it with the President before we pass it. I am not certain that 
will ever happen.
  Mr. DASCHLE addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic leader.
  Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, let me associate myself with the remarks 
made by the distinguished majority leader as to the desire to find a 
way to finish our work on all of these important matters prior to 
Memorial Day. I am relatively optimistic that is possible.
  The majority leader indicated that it is very difficult to make some 
assumption with regard to what the House may do on minimum wage. I 
understand what is normally a difficult set of circumstances in 
anticipating anything that the House would or would not do, but I am 
all the more confident that it is possible, given what has just 
happened on the budget.
  The distinguished majority leader asked if we could go to the budget 
in an expeditious way tomorrow. We are prepared to do that. I have 
indicated to him after consulting with a number of my colleagues that 
is possible. I want to go back to that point in a moment.
  That entire budget was preconferenced by Senate and House 
Republicans. Every single detail of the budget we are going to get 
tomorrow was preconferenced with the House. They decided what the 
defense number was. They decided what the discretionary number was. 
They decided what the tax number was. They decided what the entitlement 
numbers were. They decided what the overall budget plan would be. All 
of it was done.
  It seems to me if we can negotiate an entire budget for 6 years with 
the House of Representatives, certainly we could find our way to do one 
tiny little bill on the minimum wage. I hope we could find a way with 
which to address that. We have been working in good faith with the 
majority leader to find a way to make that happen. I feel we are making 
progress in that regard. All we are asking is one tiny little bill. The 
minimum wage is a tiny bill. But it has profound repercussions for the 
economic well being, the lives of millions and millions of people.
  As the majority leader made reference last week to rocket scientists, 
it does not take a rocket scientist to recognize the House could come 
up with a package surrounding the minimum wage increase that might be 
unacceptable. To declare this agreement acceptable, without any 
assurance of what the House would do--the House could come up with a 
package that we have to vote against, that the President would have to 
veto--that is no agreement, Mr. President. That is not what we are 
attempting to do. We want to find a way to accommodate the concerns of 
the majority in dealing with this tax issue in spite of the fact we 
have very serious misgivings on our side. We will have some amendments 
to address those misgivings.
  The Travel Office legislation--again, some of us have very serious 
misgivings in terms of the precedent it would set. We want to deal with 
that. Obviously, there is the TEAM Act, about which we have 
extraordinary misgivings. We will deal with that. Then there is the 
taxpayer bill of rights for which there is apparently some consensus. 
We will deal with that. Those are four pieces of legislation the 
majority wants to deal with. We say we want one, the minimum wage. All 
we ask is that we are not going to be embarrassed in coming to an 
agreement that ultimately allows us this freestanding vote that we all 
say we want but then the President will have to veto. That is not 
acceptable. Everybody understands that. That is all we are saying--
continue to work, ensure we know what the House's intentions are. If we 
can do it on a complete budget agreement, it seems to me we can do it 
on one little bill, the minimum wage bill. That is what we are talking 
about.
  Now, with regard to the budget, as I said, I have agreed to go to the 
budget resolution early tomorrow, after consultation with our caucus at 
noon and with individual Members who raised some very serious concerns 
and even though we have not yet been allowed to see the report. We are 
not going to make a big deal of the fact we do not have a report. Our 
colleagues on the Budget Committee were not even allowed to write it. 
No minority report. That was not allowed. There was no consultation 
with Democrats, at all--locked out completely.
  This proposal is the most partisan budget we have seen in many, many 
years. In fact, at the news conference I recall, the Nation was told 
this is a Bob Dole budget. It was not the Senate Budget Committee 
document. We were told, ``This is the Bob Dole budget.'' I must say, 
with all this interest in bipartisanship and accommodation and 
cooperation, when it came to the budget, we are not getting a great 
deal of it. We have not seen much yet. What goes around comes around.

  In spite of the fact that we have not been given very much, if any, 
consideration with regard to the budget so far procedurally, and it is 
going to get worse, we will go to the budget resolution and, 
eventually, to the three reconciliation bills that in my view are 
flatout illegal. We will have to face all of that in the future. We 
will go to the budget tomorrow, because in good faith we are trying to 
work through these things. We will try to deal with the budget. And we 
are trying to deal with these five bills. But we will not be pushed.
  I have had to assure my colleagues we will take all the time we need 
to have a good debate, to offer amendments. We will do all of that. We 
will

[[Page S5020]]

go to the floor tomorrow as requested of us in order to accommodate the 
majority in what we know to be a very full schedule. I hope we can 
continue to work. I am very hopeful we can achieve all that I know the 
distinguished majority leader wants to accomplish prior to the time we 
get into the Memorial Day recess.
  Mrs. BOXER. Will the Senator yield?
  Mr. DASCHLE. I am happy to yield to the Senator.
  Mrs. BOXER. My question, just so I am fully in tune with the points 
you were making, the majority leader is telling us that he cannot 
accommodate us in terms of the minimum wage; he says he cannot have any 
control over the way it is handled in the House. What I heard my leader 
say is when it comes to the budget, which is a huge document and is 
actually a 6-year budget, that, in fact, there was cooperation between 
the Senate Republicans and the House Republicans. They did, in fact, 
preconference many of these issues so that they were in step.
  Am I right in assuming when it comes to the minimum wage, the 
majority leader says: Gee, he just cannot control it, so we could agree 
to all the other measures. You point out this caucus on this side is 
split on something because we so much want to see the minimum wage take 
effect and start helping people, millions of people. I might say the 
majority of them are women, and we talk a lot about the gender gap 
around here. I think the women in this country know who is fighting for 
them.
  When it comes to this, we could give away our position, our leverage, 
and wind up with all the other bills and not the minimum wage increase. 
Is that the fear that has been expressed by the Democrat leader?
  Mr. DASCHLE. The Senator from California says it so ably and 
succinctly. That is our concern. She used the word ``cooperation'' 
between the House and the Senate. It was cooperation. But I did not go 
further. It was absolute unanimity, agreement right down the line, word 
for word, paragraph for paragraph, provision for provision. There was 
no disagreement. The joint news conferences by the chairs of both the 
House and the Senate Budget Committees certainly made that point. There 
was no disagreement whatsoever. Normally you would expect cooperation. 
This was lockstep agreement on every single detail of a 6-year budget 
agreement.
  It seems to me with that kind of precedent there ought to be an 
opportunity for one little bill, this minimum wage bill, which has such 
a profound effect on so many people all through the country. That is 
all we are hoping to do. I intend to work with the majority leader to 
ensure that happens. I yield the floor.

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